Prada / Fall 2013 RTW

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Her cavernous raw industrial show space was transformed with bleachers of untouched and unvarnished wood, velvet drapes hanging in a dilapidated fashion from the walls, with pillars in marble or transparent plastic lying abandoned alongside as if the house had fallen into disrepair a long time ago, and a projected backdrop that involved the constantly twirling shadow of a woman, a prowling cat, and a metal security grille—with a vista of mountains beyond. Few serve up drama—intriguing, mystifying, daring, and unnerving—at a show like Miuccia Pradadoes. And that’s before we have as much as gotten to the clothes, which this season shared every single one of the qualities of the environment she created. This was a strong, confident, and ravishing Prada collection, one based on what she described backstage as “raw elegance.”

Prada has, of course, in her best collections found something gorgeous in the off-kilter, the marginal, the banal, allying it with her own eternal preoccupation with bourgeois-lady chic, and this was one of those powerhouse performances. An homage to constructions—in every sense of the word—of glamour of the forties and fifties, with 48 looks that contained plenty of tweed, furs, metallic leathers, and stately handheld purses. (She admitted they’d actually had 70 looks to show, but then the editing had to begin.) Her opening salvo set the tone: a gray cardigan under a belted black wool dress strewn with jet bead and sequin blooms, one side asymmetrically falling lower to the floor via a sweeping plane of fabric (this would be a recurring silhouette), worn with brown leather high-heeled sandals with a hiking-boot tread sole.

From then on, it was mid-century tailoring—the nip-waist, full-skirted coat, the boxy suit—twisted and turned every which way. There were more of those dipping panels, deep fur cuffs, substantial sporty knitted welts on ladylike jackets, and—so deliciously perverse this, so Prada—a certain dishabille around the necklines, as if the clothes had been hastily put back on after being caught in flagrante delicto. (Or maybe it was mid-shower; every model’s hair fell in wet strands.) All of this rendered in substantial (yes, you are right in thinking that means heavy) check or thickly striped tweeds in ice blue, brown, ochre, gray, baby pink, and rust, accented with sheath dresses, swing coats, and equally swinging skirts in red, turquoise, and gold leather.

Strip this collection down from the theoretical posturings (mine, as much as hers) and what you are left with is a series of wonderful, desirable, and eminently wearable coats in a season that so far hasn’t been short on pieces to take cover under. In a way, it’s as if the coat is now as much of an accessory as a bag or boot or whatever else has been fetishized on the runways these past few years. Prada’s were certainly statement-making, the kind of thing that, when added to a wardrobe, is going to recalibrate everything else that is in there. But just as importantly, and what came through clear and loud with this collection, was that it celebrated the personal, the individual, the empowering feeling to be had from wearing something that possesses intelligence and wit and, let’s not forget, beauty. Prada might as well have added her show was about “raw emotion,” too, because that’s what it elicited, a visceral charge that’s all too rare in fashion these days.